


tête-à-tête

by cuddlesome



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Drabble, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Purple Prose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2019-06-24 14:45:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15632829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlesome/pseuds/cuddlesome
Summary: Rey and Kylo exchange verbal blows through the Force bond as usual.





	tête-à-tête

With only a handful of days of training and a pile of musty books to give her any credibility, Rey cannot in good conscience describe herself as a Jedi. Everyone else does, though. Including him.

 

“Has the irony that I, the Jedi Killer, won’t kill you, the Last Jedi, sunk in yet?”

 

That’s his opening line when the Force bridges their minds again. He discusses the subject with a clinical air. Interested, but only in a scholarly sense. As if the two of them are figures in a historical text from thousands of years ago.

 

Rey hates that tone. She wants to see his infamous rage match hers. It’s as though he stole all of her rationality away to add to his own stores, leaving her with the poor substitute of bottomless anger.

 

“You won’t kill me?” Even as Rey repeats the sentiment aloud, she isn’t sure she believes it; it’s more likely, from her perspective, that he can’t. “Don’t you wish I had those sorts of reservations?”

 

And the man posits as if it’s the most obvious thing in the galaxy and all other galaxies, besides: “You’re not cruel enough.”

 

Rey thinks she sees the faintest traces of mockery curving the edges of his mouth, ruining his otherwise permanent pout. She forces her gaze from his lips to his scar. No, it is more her scar than his, isn’t it?

 

“I can be very cruel,” she says, because she’s always game to argue with him.

 

“You think Jakku made you that way, don’t you? Like a tightfisted junk trader. Like one of those gutted ships. Like your parents.” He shakes his head.

 

There it is—dragging up her past without her permission and scoring his interpretation across it, deep and cutting as wounds from his lightsaber probably are. Not that she would know, as the ugly weapon had never so much as singed a hair on her head. The failed simile and the reminder that he’s not always hostile does nothing to cool her anger. Rey grinds her teeth together, realizing too late that she's picked up on one of his many bad habits along with clenching her fists until they hurt.

 

“But that miserable world didn’t manage to crush your capability for compassion. Not even,” he says, eyes gleaming, “when it comes to monsters.”

 

“My compassion for you ran out on the _Supremacy_ ,” she snaps.

 

The gleam dims somewhat, but nevertheless he says, “No. If it had, you wouldn’t have left me alive. Either you care more than you let on or you simply pitied me. Either way, compassion.”

 

The word is too kind. Rey doesn’t like the sound of it at all. She had no love left in her heart for him. If not on the _Supremacy,_ then on Crait.

 

She knows she should point this out, but instead she asks, “Is compassion what you felt for me? Is that what made you so soft, supreme leader?”

 

Rey tries to interject the spite she’s feeling, but it doesn’t come.

 

“Yes, scavenger,” Kylo says.

 

She doesn’t like the sound of that, either. It would be easier to hate him if he had used a filthier, more grating name. Garbage picker. Desert rat. She'd welcome being called a Jakku whore at this point. Instead he uses the word that has become more of a pet name than an insult. That, in combination with his unrelenting gaze, tugs at something deep in her belly.

 

They say nothing more for a while. Then he’s about to speak again. Rey can tell by the way he licks his lips, adding a slick lacquer to the soft pink surface.

 

She hopes for something to stop these never-ending impromptu discussions of theirs—a distraction on his side, the bond suddenly breaking, her lips mashed over his before he can get the vicious words out. Or worse, the sweet ones.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this at around 4 AM after approximately zero hours of sleep on my extremely old and battered laptop that I'll be officially replacing with a shiny new one tomorrow. Turns out when released of my inhibitions all I wanted to write was some fairly innocuous Force bond chatter. I just really enjoy writing dialogue that I hope is fairly in-character but then just surrounding it with all of this over the top dramatic prose. I hope you all enjoyed reading it as much as I did writing it.


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